


Cat & Mouse

by PL600 (succulentrat)



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, Overwatch - Freeform, Team Talon (Overwatch), Will Add More Tags Eventually
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-15 12:47:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28688892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/succulentrat/pseuds/PL600
Summary: Alani Kahananu'i, real name Hazel Castillo, has been on her own since sixteen. She's always managed to get into mischief, but now she constantly somehow ends up in Talon's way. Is it on purpose? Is it on accident? Sometimes, even she's not so sure. But she's part of an ongoing game of cat and mouse that she seems to enjoy with one particular Talon agent.
Relationships: Mauga/Original Female Character, Original Female Character - Relationship





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Don't mind me, I'm just testing the waters!
> 
> I really want Mauga to be a playable tank in the game. Please.

“Don’t let her get away!”

I ran up the steps of the tower, feeling my heart pumping in my chest. I’d spent years running away from these agents and I wasn’t about to let them catch me now. Of course, there had been times when they almost caught me, yet I had always managed to either lose them or simply disappear. This wasn’t my first rodeo and it surely wasn’t going to be my last. I looked behind me when I heard the agents tripping over themselves. The stairwell was narrow enough that each of them would have to come after me individually. That was much less preferable for them, if I did say so myself. I giggled to myself and continued my running up the tower.

What were they after? An old heirloom that I was asked to take back from the people who had originally stolen it. Normally I wouldn’t take on jobs for other people, but they were paying quite well for a simple task. Well...a simple task for me, anyway. Not just anyone could slip into the agents hideout and slip back out in a matter of minutes. I only made myself known to them by mocking them, simply because of one of the agents with them.

I felt the boom of said agent taking his armour off. There was no way he could fit through such a narrow passage with it on. Hell, he probably could barely fit already even if he wasn’t wearing it. Now, he wasn’t fat -- just extremely tall and muscular. I didn’t know why they wanted a jewel so badly, but I didn’t particularly care. I didn’t care if they had it in their possession -- I even told the people who hired me such -- until I was told I would be paid well for its return.

Now that that agent was coming up the stairs after me, as well, I knew there was no way out for me but to go up. I was quick on my feet, certainly, but his large frame probably left room only for a mouse to get out. If he wasn’t involved, I wouldn’t have bothered to tell the agents that I was there. It sucked to be them, I supposed.

Finally, I made it to the top of the tower. There was nothing but a window that didn’t even have a screen on it. It was just wide open. It served as an old watchtower from so many years ago. The place was so old, I was surprised it wasn’t crumbling or the city hadn’t had it torn down. I inhaled sharply and looked out the window and to the ground below. I couldn’t make that drop, but…

“Always getting in our way.”

I turned around to see the agent I mocked the rest for. He didn’t look all that angry, nor annoyed. For years he chased me, but only because I allowed it. The first couple of times I didn’t bother with him, but the more our paths crossed, the more I enjoyed the chase. Surely the organization he worked for would have to catch on sooner or later as to what I was doing. Even if I didn’t have any reason to cross paths with this man, I always put myself in his way. I _did_ know his organization wanted me, though; I could apparently do good for them. But I worked on my own and I worked _for_ no one. Well, I worked for no organization or company, at least. Even if Talon could pay me well, what was the fun in that? I liked the game of cat and mouse; though, it could be debated on who was the cat and who was the mouse.

“What do you people need with a jewel, anyway?” I wondered.

“Dunno,” he replied. “The guys back in Italy just want it. Give it.”

“I don’t want to give it. The family you men stole it from are paying me handsomely, Mauga.”

“Talon could pay you so much more.”

“Have we not been over this?”

The rest of the agents finally showed up with their guns. Well, now there really was no way I could just maneuver and dodge my way back down the stairs. It wasn’t my first time being cornered in a building, but it was my first time being cornered in such a high tower. I took a step back, only to glare at one of the agents when he cocked his gun.

“Max wants her alive,” Mauga told him. “Don’t even think about it.”

“Guns don’t scare me,” I reminded everyone.

“It’s not like you have anywhere to go. So just give up.”

“And what? Give up this game we have going on? I don’t feel like it.”

“Hand it over, now.”

I pouted, carefully stepping toward them. My steps were small and I stopped short of them. They thought I didn’t have anywhere to go. But I couldn’t believe that Mauga would dare forget just how ballsy I could be. I’d done some pretty risky things to get out of being cornered, like setting off a flashbang that could possibly injure me, set off an explosion that I could have gotten stuck under, and running through a police station with guns blazing.

“Alani,” Mauga warned.

“Give your bosses my regards, okay?” I said.

Quickly, I turned on my heels and ran back toward the window. I jumped out, headfirst, right before the agents began shooting at me. Just because whoever Max was wanted me alive, it didn’t mean they couldn’t hurt me. I landed right on top of a wagon of apples and caused them to go everywhere. At least I broke my fall on something that wasn’t pavement or brick, but it still hurt like mad. I tossed the fruit salesman some money to pay for the messed up fruit and began running off.

“She jumped out the window!” I heard one of the agents shout. “Get after her!”

It didn’t matter how fast they could get down the tower’s steps; I was going to be long gone. Now that I had the jewel in my possession, I just had to make it back to the family’s mansion in a whole other city. It wouldn’t be too difficult for me to get back since I was quick and nimble. I’d hold the damn thing hostage if they refused to pay me, though.

“She went this way!”

I couldn’t dilly-dally, even if I was still feeling the pain of the apples in my back. I ducked into an alley way and quickly changed, even going so far as taking my black hair out of its ponytail and putting a hat on. Like that, I was able to walk around the city leisurely without arousing anyone’s suspicion. I looked completely different, after all, and the agents with Mauga seemed to be complete and utter morons. They ran right by me on either side while I was walking around. Now that that was over, I made my way to the train station.

One of the perks of being in Europe was the fact I could hop on a train and be in another city or country within a couple of hours. I had just enough time to put myself back together and examine the jewel. It was so shiny and purple, with small flecks of gold in it. I had to wonder how much it was really worth. Obviously a lot if the family was panicked about it being gone, aside from it being an heirloom. Was no one in the past so crooked and selfish that they went against their family and simply stole it and sold it? How strange that was, unless it was protected well enough that even a cousin or something couldn’t get to it.

Once at the family’s mansion, it seemed to take forever for the ones that hired me to come and see me. I supposed that they figured if I really had it and I really wanted the money I wouldn’t mind waiting. To occupy myself, I walked up and down the main hallway, just looking at the painted portraits of the monarchs and patriarchs of the family through the ages. If I had such a family line, I didn’t know what I would do. Maybe I did have a family line like that, but I was adopted and I wasn’t interested in finding out.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, Miss Kahananu’i,” the matriarch said as she came through a set of double doors.

“Your paintings are lovely,” I replied.

“You have the jewel?”

I took a cloth out of the bag I had attached to my hip and opened it to reveal the jewel. As she reached for it, I pulled back and wrapped it back up. She looked shocked, momentarily, before appearing to be offended.

“Excuse my skepticism, ma’am,” I told her. “A girl can’t be too cautious these days. Money first.”

“Money?” she asked.

“We agreed that you would pay me a lot of money if I retrieved the jewel and brought it back to you.”

“It was foolish of you to think I would honour such a thing. You’ve no idea how much money you have in your hand -- we simply just cannot--”

“No money, no jewel. That’s how it works.”

“You’re no more than a crook; just like those people who stole it in the first place.”

I blinked at her before rolling my eyes. Heiresses -- the complete nerve they had. I didn’t steal from innocent people, but I could see that she, at least, wasn’t innocent. What was with rich people and not keeping their word to pay people? It’s not like they couldn’t afford it. I slipped the cloth, along with the jewel, back into the bag.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she snapped.

“Was I not clear, ma’am?” I asked, stepping close to her. “No money equals no jewel. Money equals jewel.”

“I could have the cops here at any moment--”

“Try it. Do you know what happened to the last person who tried that on me? Would you like to find out?”

“Guards!”

I’d never been seized in my life before and I wasn’t about to experience it. I waited for the guards to show up before pulling out a smoke bomb and slamming it onto the ground. Amidst the smoke, coughing, and confusion, I managed to get out of the mansion. I had no use for such a jewel, that was for sure. Sure, I could have sold it myself, but that was the recipe for trouble, and that was trouble I really didn’t need or want. I changed back into my civilian-style clothes -- I always dressed like a civilian, but these ones were just so I wouldn’t be spotted -- and headed back to the train station. I’d return the jewel from where I had found it. That would confuse the hell out of the agents and Mauga, but I had no use for the damn thing.

Once I was off the train again, it was early evening. The sun was setting and I didn’t know how much longer they would be at the hideout. I, again, changed back into my original clothes and headed in the direction of the hideout. There were guards out front, unlike earlier. What, did they expect me to come back or something? Well, perhaps they thought I could still be in the city, and if one of the guards spotted me they could easily notify any of the other agents. Still, how ridiculous could they be? I went around and climbed up onto the roof, where I found the sun window I had originally gone through. I popped my head in and looked around. No one was there. I jumped into the room with a sigh and placed the jewel back where I found it. Just as a courtesy, I took out my notebook and a pen and left a note.

_They refused to pay me for taking it back to them. So here you go. Give my regards to whomever Max is since he wanted it so bad. See you for the next chase._

_xox_

💋💋💋

When I wasn’t getting chased or stealing, I spent my time at my home in Hawai’i. I didn’t have family to speak of, but it was fine and it didn’t matter. My birth parents didn’t want me and my adoptive family hated me. I left my adoptive family’s home when I was just sixteen, figuring I was better off by myself. They didn’t like that I was rebellious, that I didn’t want to be like them. They worked for their money, just like I did, but in a much more boring way. I didn’t want to be stuck behind a desk or to get rich by other people doing my work for me. If I wanted something, I went out and got it myself. This, of course, landed me in big trouble with the authorities from even a young age. No matter how many times my adoptive mother yelled at me or scolded me, I didn’t listen. My adoptive father was the first of them to not bother with me anymore. My adoptive mother was the last.

Apparently I was ungrateful toward them for taking me in when they didn’t have to. Well, just like being born, I didn’t ask for it. I did excellent in school, but that was only because I didn’t want to listen to them complain and complain and complain about my grades and my teachers and principal calling them all the time. Stealing the things I wanted was the last straw for my adoptive mother. She gave me a rather crappy ultimatum -- either smarten up and be like my adoptive siblings or get out of her house. I chose the latter and I didn’t regret it. I found my birth parents, but they didn’t want me, still. I did as I pleased and got the money I needed to start the kind of life I wanted, changed my name, and that was that.

My house in Hawai’i was everything I could have asked for. It was half above water and half beneath water. The entryway, living room, and dining area was upstairs, while my bedroom, bathroom, other living room, and computer room were downstairs. It was a lot of space for one person, but I enjoyed having so much space to myself. At the adoptive family home, it was so cramped despite it being a mansion on its own. I had several older adoptive siblings and several younger adoptive siblings, along with the grandparents and some grandchildren. Just because it was a so-called ancestral home didn’t mean every single generation had to live there. There was no such thing as privacy in a house with that many people, either. I really couldn’t count the amount of times people just barged into my bedroom without so much as a knock to snoop on what I was doing.

The first time I got in Talon’s way, in Mauga’s way, was a few years after I left my adoptive family’s home. I indirectly stole an expensive vase from underneath their noses. They stole the most random things for their bosses -- hell, some of it might have just been for their own personal interests. I stole that vase and sold it, and that was the beginning of the cat and mouse game between Mauga and I. At first I was scared, but eventually I warmed up to the game. The first few times, I hadn’t even laid my eyes on him, simply because he was in his armour. After that, I encouraged such child’s play. I didn’t know what was wrong with me. If he wasn’t involved, I didn’t want to play the game, therefore I told myself, taught myself, only to make myself known if I was getting in Talon’s way and Mauga was there. Otherwise, I was in and out and they probably didn’t figure out what happened until much later.

We didn’t learn each other’s names until the first time he cornered me in an alleyway, which was also the first time I laid my eyes on his face. He was big -- tall and muscular -- and I expected for him to hurt me. Even if my adoptive parents adopted me, they treated me differently than they treated their blood children. If I got in trouble, they tried to make me regret it. So, of course, I was ready for at least a punch in the face, maybe a kick to the gut, maybe even some hair pulling. But without his armour, he didn’t have his guns, so he couldn’t shoot me. The most threatening thing he did was step closer, telling me that what I did would make me sorry. I must have only been eighteen at that point, staring down -- or, rather, _up --_ a man much bigger in stature than myself, telling him that I had never been sorry about getting in trouble in my whole life. I didn’t know why, but that seemed to make him laugh with amusement.

“You got guts,” he’d told me.

I didn’t mean to get in his way so many times, but I somehow ended up liking it. The game seemed to be fun. I doubted the higher ups in Talon appreciated that they were being outsmarted by such a young woman, but I had to get my fun somewhere. The things I stole and sold allowed me to have a comfortable and luxurious lifestyle, that was for sure. It was just a coincidence that I wanted the same objects that Talon or its members wanted. One day they were going to be ahead of me, but that day had not yet come, and until then, the game would continue.

I was raised in a society that told me money couldn’t buy happiness, but I was happier surrounded by things than people. The environment at “home” growing up was different, of course. I was conditioned that having expensive, luxurious things was good. I believed it and carried on into my new life. I wasn’t mad about it. I would rather have things surrounding me than people who could hurt me. If a vase was broken over my head -- which, one time, one was -- it wasn’t the vase that hurt me, it was the person who had hurt me. My adoptive grandfather had seen fit to do so one time when my adoptive father wasn’t home to discipline me. If that family hadn’t hurt me, would I have turned out different?

One of the worst things to happen was getting beat bad enough that I had to miss school. I still made it a point to ask my teacher’s to send me my homework and schoolwork I would be missing. What the hell warranted such a punishment? I was found out to be hanging out with a boy my adoptive family didn’t like. He was a good enough boy, got good grades, but the problem was that he wasn’t as well off as “we” were. I refused to stop seeing him and I got hurt, which led me to believe I wasn’t allowed to have nice things. I even broke up with this boy because I was scared they would do something to him. I didn’t tell him or my teachers why I missed school; it wasn’t like they would believe me, right? If I wanted to be rescued, I had to rescue myself, and my adoptive mother allowed me to do that by giving me that crappy ultimatum.

But being hurt so much was what made me confused as to why Mauga didn’t bother touching me, even as I got more ballsy and cocky toward him and the people he worked for. Maybe deep down I was testing him to see how far he would go until he felt he had to hurt me. Maybe then it really would solidify that I could have nothing good in my life. I liked seeing him and talking to him, even if it was only for a moment, but I was still cautious when I needed to be. I caused so many problems for him just to see how far I could take it. What even was wrong with me? Perhaps I could trust him not to hurt me, but there was no reason for him to keep the other agents he worked with from hurting me. Like that one agent in the tower -- Mauga could have at least let him shoot me to just wound me so I couldn’t escape, but he didn’t.

I could easily hide from him and the rest of Talon with no issues. I looked different with my hair down and when I had my tattoos covered with sleeves and skirts or pants. Beneath the layers of my hair, I had a lotus shaved onto the sides of my scalp that showed when I had it up in a ponytail. As for my tattoos, they could easily be recognized. For these reasons, whenever I didn’t want to be caught or recognized, whether I was at home or out running regular people errands or sneaking around a city, I’d simply wear a blue sweater along with some pants that covered most of my body, and let my hair down. Otherwise, I’d be wearing a halter top and shorts so as not to get too hot while running and jumping from people who may have been chasing me. 

If I had small tattoos, then perhaps I wouldn’t have had to worry about hiding them, but no. My right arm had a complete sleeve of waves and flowers, my left having stars trailing down the length of it; as for my legs, my left had clouds and flowers all over it, and my back had a large antique pocket watch paired with an octopus. The smallest tattoo I had was of the bird I had on my right shoulder. I was easily recognizable just by my hair, but once I threw in my tattoos and I could be done for if I didn’t change what I looked like on the outside.

Well...those were really the only things on the outside I could change. I couldn’t change my eyes, even if I wanted to. My right eye was… Well, I was born with it being red, and my left eye was a regular amber colour. As long as I kept my head down when I was “disguised”, I was perfectly fine.

My eye was a whole other reason why I would get in trouble as a kid. Just because my marks were good in school it didn’t mean I didn’t get into my fair share of fights. Luckily they weren’t during school hours, so my teachers never had to call my parents. Those fights were planned at the park after school. Many of the other kids didn’t like how I looked -- I was too dark for them, but my eye was the real problem. I wasn’t scared of them or their friends. I was ordinarily able to beat the hell out of them myself, but only once they tried to land several shots without hurting me. I didn’t mind fighting, for it allowed me to get my anger and resentment toward my adoptive parents out. I’d make quick work of them, too, so I wouldn’t get into trouble for being late getting “home”. Time and time again, though, the other kids’ parents would call my “parents” and tell them what I did to them. The kids did learn their lessons, though, but there were more. There were _always_ more of them.

Having left my adoptive family at sixteen, I also stopped going to school. Because I was sixteen and didn’t finish, obviously I didn’t make my way into college in the next couple of years. It wasn’t like I needed it when I could do what I did. It was the truth that I didn’t steal from innocent people -- only from people who deserved it. Talon was full of bad people, who stole from good and bad people alike, so it was fine if I stole directly from underneath their noses, so long as the person they were originally stealing from weren’t innocent people. Of course, one time Mauga had got me cornered and asked me if I believed that if anyone was truly innocent. There were people more innocent than others, but of course no one, except for babies, was actually completely clean of bad things.

But just to see something good in the world, even if it was only for a few hours a week during the weekends, I would volunteer at a soup kitchen. There were so many people worse off than me and, overall, a better person than me. These were people who did whatever they had to in order to survive. Times had been incredibly rough for so long. The Omnic war from so long ago was still showing effects years later. People had lost their families, their jobs, their homes. It was just so horrible. Even if I stole and I killed, I at least could make these people happy, even if only for a moment. Some of the money I made would always go toward multiple charities, and I’d buy families toys at Christmas. It was probably risky for me to put myself out there like that because of Talon, but it didn’t matter.

As far as I knew, I was safe in Hawai’i from Talon. If they knew where I lived, then they probably would have made themselves known a long time ago. Mauga and I had been playing cat and mouse for five years and they still hadn’t managed to find me. They could have, but they would have probably had me kidnapped. I was, to them, an escape artist, though, and so they were most likely waiting for a moment when my guard really was down and I didn’t have time to think of an escape plan. Nothing could probably top swan diving out of a tower into a wagon full of apples.


	2. Chapter 2

Sometimes if the soup kitchen was too busy, the organizers would send one or two of us out onto the floor to look after the smaller children while their parents were getting food. Much of the time, too, many parents would drop their children off so we could watch them while they had errands to run or had a job to get to. It wasn’t always like that, but times were always so tough. The community was tight knit enough that everyone knew each other. I was usually the one sent out onto the floor, either by myself or with one other person, to be a babysitter. Children were pure and the ones that came to the soup kitchen were humble. They never complained that they didn’t have possessions or money -- they understood, just the same as the adults, that sometimes life was a struggle.

The happiest I really saw them was during the holidays. I’d get gifts for everyone; just something to brighten their year. Even if the parents insisted that they didn’t want or need anything and that they just wanted me to focus on their children, I gave them enough where they didn’t feel like they were being a burden on me. Sometimes a family needed a new computer or needed their car fixed; I would do whatever they needed me to. It wasn’t their fault that jobs were scarce or things were so expensive it could easily cost an arm or a leg if they paid out of pocket. So long as I had the money to spare -- and I had a lot of it -- I would share what I had.

“Miss Kahana, where are you when you’re not here?” a little girl asked, not being able to pronounce my full name.

“I’m at home, waiting to come back here,” I replied. “If I’m not in the city, I’m travelling.”

“What’s it like to travel? Is it fun?”

Well...the type of travelling I did was both for leisure and profit. I was supposed to be heading out again quite soon to Italy to attend an art exhibit. There was a jewel there that would set my small Hawaiian village up for at least a couple of years. The travelling was fun, considering I got to see other countries, but my work came first, especially when that work involved getting something for my village. Nobody knew where the money I donated came from. I had seemingly just showed up out of nowhere, had my half-submerged house built, and began doing good for my new community. Sometimes I worried I wouldn’t come back to them, that somehow I would get sick and would be unable to return home, but I did my best for them.

“It’s fun,” I said.

“When do you leave again?” the little girl wondered.

“Tomorrow morning. I shouldn’t be gone for too long this time.”

“Could you bring me back a necklace or a bracelet?”

I hesitated to answer. I didn’t want to disappoint this little girl, but I didn’t know what the circumstances in Italy would be. I promised her that I would try to bring her back something. She liked dolls, I knew that much. If jewellery was too risky for me to take home, then a doll should have been fine. Instead of answering her, I gave her a smile.

“Oh, Miss Kahananu’i,” her mother said, wandering up to us. “Why must you wear your hair down? You are making me hot just looking at you.”

“Apologies, Miss Mercia,” I replied. “As I have said before, I don’t look very good with my hair up.”

Quite the contrary, really; I looked amazing with my hair up. I preferred it that way, but for my village’s sake I had to wear it down. I  _ had  _ to look different for them, lest someone from Talon, or someone who had Talon connections, recognized me should they come to my village. I didn’t even wear my hair up in the privacy of my own home. Just because I was a bad person to people who deserved it didn’t mean I had to put the people I cared about in danger. I wasn’t  _ that  _ bad of a person. Or maybe I  _ was _ and I was just telling myself that I wasn’t. Well, it didn’t matter; the village and the people within it were safe for the time being. Maybe staying as long as I did wasn’t the best move, but it wasn’t like I could stay somewhere else for too long.

“Are you alright?” Mercia inquired when I let out a heavy sigh.

“Hm?” I looked up at her. “Oh, yes. Just thinking; that’s all. I will be heading out again tomorrow. I will be trying to bring something back for Elle and was wondering if you would like something.”

“You should enjoy your vacations instead of worrying over us.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Come on, Elle. Let’s let Miss Kahananu’i return to work.”

Elle took her mother’s hand and they both wandered away from me. They were the newest villagers, having only been in the village for less than six months. It wasn’t my business as to why they were there, but I had overheard Mercia speaking of how she escaped a raid on her small village just before arriving. That must have been awful, especially for Elle. That little girl wasn’t even out of her third year of school yet and she experienced such an event. They settled in well, especially once they crossed paths with me. I was able to get them on their feet in a nice apartment. Even if Mercia had been able to find an okay paying job, she still needed monetary help every now and again, and I was only too happy to oblige. She could deny my help all she wanted, but I wouldn’t take “no” for an answer.

I looked at my phone and saw that it was getting late. The kitchen would be closing soon, so I had to hurry and help feed the other people who needed it before cleaning up the back room that wasn’t really a room. I did regret not having my hair up in such hot weather, in such a hot building. It couldn’t even be considered a building, really, but rather a large hut that was made from resources found around the village. There was nothing unnatural about it, aside from the massive pot we had sitting over a fire to warm the soups. I was seemingly a completely different person when I was visiting home. It really was for the better, and if the heat punished me for it then I would endure it. At least with the sun setting, the heat would eventually, hopefully, subside. I always insisted on moving the hut closer to the beach so at least there was a nice breeze, but it was often ignored due to the fact it hadn’t been moved in years.

It didn’t take long to finish cleaning up the tables and the pot, but it was always a struggle to get the hut secure for the night. Sometimes the clasps holding the protective tent over the hut would snap open before we could actually even shut the thing. This was all just a precaution so that if we had a storm during the night it wouldn’t destroy the hut or carry it off into the middle of the ocean. The clasps were the one thing that I didn’t like about being home; otherwise it was all fine.

As I walked into my house, I tossed my bag onto the kitchen counter. Maybe it wouldn’t have hurt to leave sooner rather than later. It would at least give me time to take a look at the art gallery’s structure for longer than I originally had planned. Perhaps there was no use putting off the inevitable. I took out my phone and cancelled the flight meant for the next morning and instead got one for that night. Quickly, I packed what I would need for the gallery. There was my crossbow that allowed me to hook shot to a greater height -- I hardly ever used it, but in this situation it would probably come in handy; my poison darts -- not enough poison to kill whomever I shot one at, but rather just put to sleep or even confuse; my smoke bombs and my gun. That was all the things that I’d need for  _ after  _ the gallery opening. During, all I needed was to have my hair down and my dress.

The dress in question was a pretty burgundy with slightly puffed sleeves at the top and a slit down the front on the left side. My tattoos would show in such a dress, and so I always went ahead and wore matching evening gloves and tights that were the same colour as my skin. The tattoo on my shoulder could easily be hidden by my hair. It was a simple enough disguise, especially since it wasn’t totally a disguise at all. The hardest bit about mingling among art connoisseurs and curators was that they liked to speak with the people around them. Of course I spoke to them, but I danced around the subject of my name. I wasn’t one to willingly give my name out to anyone outside of my village. I really would have preferred to get in after hours and just steal the jewel, but I didn’t know the layout of this particular art gallery. I also knew that I probably wasn’t the only one who was going to try and steal the damn thing. The faster I could take it the faster I could get my village more money.

After the gallery in Italy, I didn’t know if I was going to stick around in my village. This art gallery was in Italy -- Rome, to be exact -- and from what I overheard multiple times by Talon agents, that’s where they originated from. Maybe I was safe, but I could never be too sure. Of course, I wasn’t worried about myself, but rather about whether or not I could get more money for the people who needed it. The money I would get from the jewel would be going toward the hospital. Well, it really couldn’t be called a hospital, could it? Even if they  _ did  _ call it such, it was more like a clinic with four rooms, one of which was meant only for pregnant women about to give birth and another for cases that had to be isolated. I would have had an actual hospital built, but there weren’t nearly enough doctors and nurses on the island to fill it out and no one wanted to be  _ that  _ indebted to me.

As I dragged my suitcase out of the house, it was like the air was thick and soupy. It was slightly hard to breathe, but that really was the least of my problems living on an island. A lot of the time I forgot to even put gas in my boat. There was only a little bit left in the reserve, just enough to get me to the mainland. Our island was so small that it didn’t have enough room for even the smallest runway strip for commercial airlines or Cessnas to land on. If anyone wanted to catch an airplane, they had to take a personal boat to the mainland and find their way to the airport from there. Most of the people on the island had never been off of it, especially the elders. Hell, even people who came to the island to live never even bothered to leave ever again, even if they were from the island over, or the mainland. They lived, worked, and died on the island.

I placed a reminder on the wheel to fill the gas up for whenever I got home, otherwise I would probably end up stranded in the middle of the ocean. With my suitcase secured behind me, I started up the engine and headed off. Maybe the scariest bit of living on an island was the amount of water that surrounded it. Of course, the water didn’t scare me and the things in the water didn’t scare me. It was what could put me  _ in  _ the water. If I went swimming, I was fine, but if I was knocked out and thrown into the ocean to die -- now  _ that  _ scared me. Should Talon find out where I lived, I doubted that the agents’ first reaction would be to try and drown me. Jumping into the ocean and being shot at? The water wasn’t what would kill me; it’d be the gunshots.

I shook my head upon hearing fish jumping out of the water and realized I was already at the mainland. I quickly tethered the boat to the docks, grabbed my suitcase, and made my way to the airport. The airport staff knew me enough to know that I must have been going elsewhere, again. I never spoke too much inside the airport; oftentimes, I’d only answer in nods or shakes of my head, sometimes audibly answering with, “Mm-mm,” or, “Uh-huh”, or even, “No.” Never did I reply with full sentences unless absolutely necessary. Travelling so often, I knew how long some flights could take. To get to Rome was going to be just over a day, already, and I didn’t want to talk to anybody  _ until  _ I landed.

Whenever I flew, I also never used my real name. Well, it wasn’t like Alani Kahananu’i was my real name to begin with. Okay, it  _ was,  _ but it wasn’t the name I had been saddled with when I was a baby. I used a false name wherever I could; I had the money to have fake identification cards made whenever and wherever I pleased. It was just another precaution I took, but I knew it wouldn’t work forever.

💋💋💋

The jewel was locked behind a glass case, which was locked inside a cage. It wouldn’t be too difficult to get the system deactivated to get inside. I spent most of the evening just wandering around, looking at the rest of the art exhibit. The Mona Lisa was on loan from the Louvre; it was interesting to see it again. I’d only been to Paris once before and that was merely for a leisure holiday. As I continued to wander around, though, I felt a chill run up my spine. Someone was watching me.

As a waiter passed me, I turned to him and grabbed a champagne flute to make it seem like I had no idea I had eyes on me. I looked around, appearing to be looking at the art next to me. There was no one I could particularly see looking at me. It couldn’t have just been my imagination playing tricks on me. Someone was  _ definitely  _ watching me. Still, I remained calm and continued to walk around. It must have only been a few moments until I managed to catch just who was watching me. Perhaps he was young, perhaps he wasn’t; I could never tell when it came to those of Asian descent. This one was from a...Vietnamese background, maybe? There were enough people in the room dressed so nicely -- dresses, suits, what-have-you -- that, if this man didn’t have his eyes boring into my back, I could mistake them as a businessperson. But just from his attention on me, I knew what he was; just the same as he knew who I was.

My eyes must have given me away. I didn’t know if he was trying to be noticed on purpose or not, but it didn’t matter; I knew what he was looking for. His boss must have known I would have been there. Why wouldn’t I have been there? But what did they want with this damn jewel? They already had the heirloom jewel I took back to them the month before. They were as greedy as me. I waited until a group of people walked by me and slipped in with them. They didn’t even seem to notice, either.

I couldn’t stick around at all; I knew when the gallery closed and when to take my chance. Once I was sure that I was good to go, I placed the flute down on the table at the entrance and made my way outside. The sun was long set by now, but the streets were still busy with residents and tourists alike. Should that man follow me out onto the street, I could easily lose him again amidst the crowds. My hotel wasn’t far from the gallery -- probably a bad decision on my part. If anyone came looking for me there and they described me to the ladies at the front desk, they would be led straight to me. I really couldn’t think about being caught -- not when I needed to get that money for my village.

I waited in my room for the hustle and bustle on the streets to die down. Should anything bad happen, I really didn’t want any innocent people caught in gunfire or a simple chase. I had to guess that I was so nervous about this job because I was in Talon territory and I was so close to being caught. Maybe it would have been better for me to just go home and just give the village some money out of my own account. It wasn’t like I couldn’t afford it. No -- I had to do it for them. The jewel was worth more than what I could give them from my own personal funds. I wasn’t even going to be taking any of it for myself.

“Get in, disarm the system, grab the jewel, get out,” I told myself as I put my sandals on. “Get in, disarm the system, grab the jewel...get out…”

What felt like only minutes was actually a couple of hours. I looked out my window while I pulled my hair back into my signature ponytail. If I needed to return to my hotel just to escape, I needed more of a plan. If that man returned to wherever the headquarters was and told them he had seen someone matching my description, I was in a lot of trouble. What were the chances that they knew what hotel I was staying at? There were several windows in my room; three along one wall, none of which I would be able to fit through; two along another, barely big enough for just me to jump out of -- I’d have to leave my suitcase behind, which contained my flight information and other personal effects; one on the ceiling that I would only be able to get out of with my crossbow hook; and, of course, the balcony. I had to be safe rather than sorry later on, and so I climbed up on top of the desk and unlatched the ceilings window, before jumping down and unlocking the balcony door.

“Get in...grab the jewel… What? No…” I muttered to myself, closing the room’s door behind me. “Get in...disarm the system...grab the jewel...run like hell… Yes. Okay…”

I’d never been so worried to steal a goddamn jewel before. I told myself that it wasn’t too late to just return home and forget about it; that I could just get the village a different jewel some other time. But if I just let this one go after realizing a Talon agent was at the gallery with me, it meant they knew I was scared of  _ something.  _ I wasn’t even sure what exactly I was scared of. Maybe it was the fact that no one would banter with me like Mauga did should they send someone else and that I really wouldn’t be able to get out in time. I had to suck it up, though.

_ I can do this,  _ I thought as I ran through the shadows.  _ I know I can. I’ve done worse, right? Right? _

Had I done worse, though? I was basically in the lions’ den and they were more than likely waiting for me to make my move, just to see how ballsy I could get. Doing such a thing with just Mauga and some agents, I never knew who the cat was and I never knew who the mouse was. But in this situation I was so sure that I was the mouse. I shook my head to rid the thought of being prey and stopped in the darkness of an alleyway.

There were guards outside the double doors that led into the gallery. I’d have to take care of them first. Taking the crossbow from my hip, I aimed it at the building. I gripped the handle, bracing myself for the sudden force that would pull me forward. It was over in just a second; it always was, and yet I never got used to the feeling of gravity pushing back against my body. I held onto the side of the building tightly as I maneuvered myself to look below me.

_ Only two guards,  _ I thought.  _ Piece of cake. _

I inhaled sharply and let go of the gallery’s outer wall, landing on either of the guards’ shoulders after a few seconds. Before they could react, I pulled my legs inward, forcing their heads together to knock themselves unconscious. It had been a while since I had done that. I smiled secretly to myself.

“Get in...disarm the security system...grab the jewel, get out,” I panted quietly as I pulled one guard into the shadows.

I pulled the other guard into the opposite shadows and felt around his body for a keycard or passcode of some sort. It was in his pants pocket. Sighing with relief, I ran to the doors that the two of them had been guarding and inserted the keycard. I retrieved my crossbow and attached it back onto my shorts. The gallery was now locked behind a large gate. It wasn’t anything I had to worry about since the keycard worked on that, too. I managed to hide from the other guards by sneaking across the support beams and rafters. Where was the security system for that damned jewel?

“You check the system for the cage?” one guard asked.

“The jewel is fine,” another replied. “No one is getting into the gallery at all with those two out front.”

I almost started laughing. “Those two” were having nice little naps. I soon found out that the security system for the cage and the glass were in an office upstairs. Why was the office always upstairs? I rolled my eyes and began climbing up toward where it supposedly was. It was simple to find; a soft white glow came from the window. Inside, the guard who was meant to be watching over it was passed out, snoring. I didn’t know what was more cliche -- guards being so unaware of their surroundings, letting would-be thieves know where to go, or security guards passed out at their posts. It was just like in those old bad movies my adoptive parents used to watch. How tacky.

I rolled my eyes as I made my way over to the stairs that led into the security office. The keycard I took from the guard outside worked on this one, too. Were these people morons? They should have been smarter and made different keycards or passcodes for each door someone had to enter. Though, of course, they  _ were  _ making my job a whole lot easier. I walked slowly over to the computers to see which one I had to disarm. Just my luck; all the labels were written in Italian. I let out an annoyed sigh.

“Hey, wha--?” the guard, now awake and barely alert, began to ask.

“Shut up,” I muttered, giving him a good wack in the neck. “Frickin’ morons…”

I leaned on the console, trying my best to think if I had ever seen the Italian word for “jewel”. If I really wanted to, I could have just pressed every single button that was next to a label. But that would possibly bring catastrophe and trip an alarm or twenty. I didn’t even have the jewel yet and I still had to figure out how to erase the security tapes. The security tapes were easy to find; all I had to do was jam the circuits for those and I was fine. But the jewel… The jewel was a ruby, so maybe the Italian word for “ruby” would be similar enough. I just had to stop looking around rapidly and focus on each label.

“ _ Rubino, _ ” I muttered, pressing the button and then sliding the keycard through the reader. “Duh, Alani.”

I ran out of the office and looked over the railing; sure enough, the glass and the cage had been lowered. Now that I’d done that, I had to move quickly.

“Hey, what the hell?” one of the guards shouted. “Someone disarmed the security system!”

Okay, well, I had to move  _ quicker.  _ I had to time my movements right, otherwise I would hurt myself, too. Just as he and his partner were heading for the stairs, I jumped over the railing and landed on the one in front. The one behind couldn’t even cock his gun fast enough; I side-swept underneath him, causing him to land flat on his face. The guard beneath me groaned as he tried to reach for his gun. Standing up, I stomped him hard enough on his neck that I heard it crack. As for the other guard, I’d only given him a nose bleed. I kicked him in the side of the head, knocking him out.

“Jeez, five men against one woman?” I asked. “It’s almost like I have more training than you do.”

I ran over to the jewel and grabbed it before wrapping it up in a cloth and securing it inside my pocket. Just before I could breathe a sigh of relief, I heard a gun cock. No way that those guys were awake already. I turned around, ready to hit someone else in the throat, only to realize I was staring down the barrel of an unfamiliar gun. Looking at the person behind the gun, I saw they were wearing Talon armour.

“No way out,  _ sè, _ ” he said.

“It’s not polite to point a gun at a lady,” I told him.

“Baptiste, you got her?” Mauga asked.

The man known as Baptiste -- bless him, really -- turned to answer him. I gave Mauga the smallest of waves before grabbing my crossbow and pointing it at the ceiling. As I made it up to the catwalk, I could hear them both swear. I laughed, absolutely giddy, while I ran toward the exit I had managed to pre-plan for myself. Had none of their other agents expected me to have a plan? Well, obviously not, considering every other escape I had made had been purely opportunistic or improv. Did they forget to tell Baptiste not to take his eyes off of me or had they expected me to just wait to see what would happen?

But they were still on my tail. If I wasn’t fast, they would catch up to me in no time. I had to reach my hotel room quickly and grab my suitcase and hightail it to the airport before they could find out where I was or where I was going. I could hear the distant sound of Mauga’s guns going off, meaning the guards had returned to consciousness or more had been dispatched. Maybe one of the last guards I had knocked out pressed some kind of button on their person. In any case, if the gallery was swarming with guards, it wouldn’t last. I had seen first hand as to what Mauga’s guns could do and the aftermath wasn’t pretty. Had they only sent Mauga and Baptiste after me, or had I just completely bypassed other agents?

Just as I was jumping over to another roof, a different gunshot rang out. I grabbed my arm out of reflex, missing the ledge I was supposed to grab onto. There wasn’t even enough time to grab my crossbow, either; I hit the brick of the street with a loud  _ slam!  _ I was only so lucky that it hadn’t been a far enough fall to completely harm me. It hurt, but nothing was broken, though I sure was going to be sore for a couple of days again. I didn’t know who shot me, but it sure as hell wasn’t Mauga; there was no way he could have caught up to me  _ that  _ fast.

Now I was left with no choice but to run through the streets and alleyways, in the complete opposite direction I was supposed to go in. There was no way I could hide in the city for too long. I had to find a detour back to my hotel room. Everything looked so different in the dark. I didn’t know where I was going. Was being chased through a city I had no idea of the layout of for a stupid ruby even worth it? My village was worth it, but it wouldn’t mean a damn thing if I got killed or taken. I soon found myself at a dead end alley.

My heart was beating so fast that I thought I was going to pass out. I could hear the distant footsteps of Mauga in his combat armour, along with whom I suspected to be Baptiste. My fingers wrapped around the handle of my crossbow, but when I actually brought it up to shoot it I saw that my fall had bent the claw.

_ Just give them the ruby,  _ my subconscious told me.  _ This isn’t worth it. Give them the ruby. _

I leaned against the wall in front of me, fighting myself. Maybe it was right. Maybe it really wasn’t worth it. I inhaled sharply as the footsteps stopped at the other end of the alleyway. There was no escaping the situation unless I gave either myself or the ruby up.

“Do we really need her?” Baptiste asked. “She’s just a girl.”

“Why would you need me for?” I snapped, turning to look at him.

Perhaps by reflex, he shot at me; luckily I was able to move out of the way.

“Hey, watch it!” I shouted. “I’m unarmed here!”

“Yeah?” Mauga asked, gesturing to the gun on the other side of my shorts.

“If I’m not holding it in my hands, I’m technically unarmed.”

“Just trying to scare you…” Baptiste muttered.

“Guns don’t scare me.”

“So what’s your next party trick, then?” Mauga wondered. “Jumping out a window, basically flying outta sight -- remember the time you backflipped into the ocean?”

“Not as impressive as the tower and the apples. Anyway, you got the last jewel; what do you want with this one?”

Mauga shrugged, but kept his guns trained on me. The back and forth wasn’t as fun as the actual chase, but it was still nice. Whatever in the nine realms of hell was even the matter with me? This man originally wanted to kill me for getting in his way.

“What do  _ you  _ want with it?” Baptiste demanded.

“I wanna sell it so I can give the money to my village,” I admitted.

My answer made Mauga laugh loud enough that if we were in a room with four walls it would be even louder. Baptiste and I just stared at each other for a long moment. Perhaps Mauga laughed because he never expected for me to say something so selfless. He must have been used to my sarcasm and quick wit that my answer was merely another sarcastic reply. But when he realized that neither of us were laughing, he stopped.

“What, you’re  _ serious? _ ” he said.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” I retorted. “The money isn’t just always for me. I’m a bad person, but my village is my home.”

“They ever thank you?”

I stared at him. What did he mean -- did they thank me? Of course they… They had thanked me before, right? Hadn’t they? Even if I didn’t expect thanks, did any of the villagers say it to me? “Thank you, Alani”? “Thank you, Miss Kahananu’i”? No. No, they hadn’t. Not even the children. The parents didn’t even urge the kids to say it. Did they just see me as some kind of rich benefactor or what? I took the cloth out of my pocket and unwrapped the ruby. Maybe it really wasn’t worth it. Maybe I should have just forgotten about it. I was helping them out of whatever kindness I had, or was it really only because I wanted a safe place to live? Somewhere I could be by myself and not be hassled by so many people I wanted to set everything on fire?

“Knew it,” Mauga said. “Why bother helpin’ ’em?”

“Just take it,” I huffed, tossing the ruby to Baptiste.

“Talon still wants you.”

“I don’t work for anyone, remember? Besides, it’s not like it’d be the last time we cross paths when it comes to stuff your bosses want.”

“They’d treat you right. Pay you right. Dunno why you wouldn’t wanna take up an offer like that, but…” He shrugged. “I don’t think you got much choice.”

“You really don’t,” a new voice said.

That Vietnamese man I had seen at the gallery made himself known by squeezing in between Baptiste and Mauga. Great; my hunch had been correct. Well, it had been more of a hunch. If I didn’t have a choice in whether or not to go back with them, I supposed there wasn’t any use fighting it. Even if I did have a gun, both Baptiste and Mauga were wearing combat armour and this other man was… Well, I had a strong feeling he’d been the one who had shot me and had missed on purpose.

“Aw, dammit,” I complained with a pout. “Fine…”

“Please, act your age,” the man replied, walking forward and grabbing my injured arm.

“Hey, ow. You don’t have to use all that strength, you know.”

“Stop talking.”

“I’m telling you right now that I like strong men. Is that offensive or something?”

“We are all aware that you enjoy the company of strong men.”

“Should I fix that arm of hers, Nguyen?” Baptiste asked.

“No, she’ll be fine.”

“Combat medic and strong?” I looked at Baptiste. “That’s good, too.”

“I said stop talking.”


	3. Chapter 3

“I don’t know how you managed to slip away so many times, but I assure you that you won’t be able to any-- Are you listening?”

“You don’t know how I was able to get away so often, blah, blah, blah,” I muttered, sitting up straight and placing my feet firmly on the ground. “I won’t be able to anymore, blah, blah, blah… Is the next thing you’re going to say is that I’ll need to be whipped around or something? You know I came along willingly.”

Nguyen stared at me, unimpressed, while I stared back at him, equally unimpressed. How did he not know how I had been able to escape so much? Did Mauga ever mention how I did? Had he not heard us talking back and forth about backflipping into the ocean or swan diving out of a tower? The guy seemed like the type to hear everything even when he wasn’t purposely listening. Then of course he’d gone and indirectly broken my grappling hook, and now we were sitting in a windowless room, which I was sure he was just going to leave me in.

“I’m not even that important,” I scoffed. “So what if I managed to get in your way so many times over things that we both wanted? You guys need money, I need money -- it was just a coincidence that those jewels and vases and paintings were things we both wanted.”

“I really could care less about what it is that you want,” he replied.

I pretended to be offended and placed my hand on my chest. “Ouch. You’re so  _ cold. _ ”

“If it were up to me, you would be buried already. But Talon wants you, so I’m holding off.”

“No one has told me what you guys want me for yet.”

Nguyen really didn’t want to tell me anything about...well, anything, but he was stuck with telling me whatever it was he needed to. Perhaps I was just being too annoying for him. Could I possibly be so annoying that they’d change their minds and send me on their way or just kill me outright? What, did they need me to kill someone, steal something, or get something back? I couldn’t help if he didn’t tell me and I also couldn’t escape because I was pretty sure he would shoot me -- or at me -- again before I even made it to the door that I thought I heard lock behind us.

“What is it?” I wondered. “A jewel, actual money, a painting…? Don’t you already have people for that?” I gestured toward the door. “Don’t think I didn’t see how many agents you actually have.”

“It’s a delicate situation,” Nguyen admitted. “You’re fast and efficient, from what I’m told.”

“That’s not a compliment, is it?”

“No. It’s not that we don’t have agents, Kahananu’i; we have assassins.”

“Oh, so you need a thief. This is your way of saying I’m good at what I do. You really know how to flatter a girl, don’t you?”

“Could you act professional?”

I sighed. “Thank you for the compliment, Nguyen.”

“Let’s just get this out of the way, shall we? I don’t trust you.”

“Have I actually done  _ anything  _ to make you not trust me? I’ve never killed any agents, much less hurt them, and, in case you weren’t aware, I surrendered that stupid jewel last month to Mauga. Or is it that you just don’t trust anybody?”

He didn’t answer me and instead stood from where he was sitting, gesturing for me to follow him. Well, at least I wasn’t going to be locked in a room for however long. Really, I didn’t care if he trusted me or not. He broke my hook and shot me; I didn’t  _ not  _ trust him, that was for certain, and he even told that Baptiste guy not to fix my arm. It was well past bleeding and hurting, but shouldn’t I at least have gotten it disinfected or something? I rolled my eyes as I followed him down the hallway.

“Hey, it’s the jewel I stole back last month,” I said, stopping in front of a display case.

“It’s staying there until we find a buyer,” Nguyen immediately said, grabbing my arm and shoving me forward.

“Calm down; I’m not gonna try anything. You have a nice grip, you know that?”

“Save it.”

We ended up at the door he had initially brought me through after they had caught me in that alleyway. I didn’t know what exactly we were waiting for, but it didn’t take long for me to realize that we were waiting on somebody else. Baptiste and Mauga eventually appeared at the very end of the hallway, but soon enough it was just Mauga. He wasn’t wearing his combat armour, which made me think that we weren’t doing anything too serious.

“Hurry up,” Nguyen snapped.

“If it ain’t serious, why do I have to hurry?” Mauga retorted playfully.

“So then...what is it that we’re doing?” I asked.

I didn’t get an answer; Nguyen just went out the door before me and, again, gestured for me to follow him. So, what, now he wasn’t even going to talk to me? Either he was tired of me talking or he didn’t like talking at all, or both. It was probably the former, of course. I had a way of making people want to gouge out their eardrums. It wasn’t like I did it on purpose. Okay, it was, but if he wanted me to shut up all he had to do was tell me to shut up. Okay, that probably wouldn’t have worked, either.

“What are we doing?” I asked again, this time looking up at Mauga.

Nguyen sighed, annoyed. “You’re handing over personal documents to us.”

I looked back at him. “I’m doing  _ what? _ ”

“Calm down; you can have them back when you’ve proven yourself.”

“Fine, but how do you expect for  _ him  _ to fit inside my hotel room’s door?”

“Hey, ow,” Mauga said, pretending to sound hurt.

“Have you  _ seen  _ yourself? You’re a giant who could pick me up and break me in half if you wanted to.”

“You make that sound like it’s a bad thing.”

“I never said it was.”

The rest of the walk to my hotel was quiet; it was early morning still and people were only just waking up or opening their shops. To say the lady at the front desk look concerned was an understatement; one girl coming into the building with one man who could probably murder someone with just a glare and a giant would probably make even the stoicest of people wet themselves. I let out a giggle to myself at the thought.

“What is so funny?” Nguyen demanded.

“Nothing,” I replied, pressing the button for the elevator. “If the elevator stops because of a weight overload, who do I blame?”

“Be quiet. We’re taking the stairs, anyway.”

“I’m on the tenth floor.”

“You heard me.”

I folded my arms across my chest and proceeded to sit on the floor. No way was I willingly going to walk up ten flights of stairs, especially since I hadn’t slept at all after being caught. I should have been on a flight back to Hawai’i already, for goodness’ sake. But, no, Talon had to be a bunch of babies about a ruby. Now, I didn’t know what sitting on the floor would accomplish; Mauga could easily pick me up and throw me over his shoulder without breaking a sweat, and that’s exactly what he did. I didn’t bother complaining, though, considering I wasn’t doing any actual walking.

“Which room is yours?” Nguyen asked when we finally made it to my floor.

I pulled my keycard out of my pocket. “Six.”

The room was just as I had left it. Before I even went searching for my fakes and my reals, I gathered up some clothes and headed to the back of the room before Nguyen spoke up.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.

“I’m taking a shower,” I said, turning to look at him. “Why, you wanna join me?”

Mauga was just completely ignoring us both, looking through the mini-bar on the other side of the room.

“I won’t try anything,” I reassured Nguyen. “Just give me fifteen minutes.”

“Fifteen and not a second longer.”

I could get away from them by using the window that was in the washroom, but then how would I get anywhere? All my money and my reals and fakes were hidden away in a hidden zipper of my luggage. If I did even try anything, I didn’t even know what would happen. I really couldn’t put it past the higher ups to shove me in some room to punish me or whatever. They wouldn’t be able to scare me that easily, of course. Guns were out of the question, so what else did they have? Torture? Well, if they tried torture, they would get an interesting surprise out of me, that was for sure. If all I had to do was behave and prove loyalty, I’d be able to go home soon enough. Even if I was having second thoughts about the people I helped, my house that I loved so much was still there.

All I really needed to do in the shower was wash my hair and finally clean the wound I got from being shot, but I said fifteen minutes and I was going to leave it up till the very last second to go back out into the common area. If Nguyen didn’t calm down or relax, he was going to give himself high blood pressure or a heart attack, or maybe both. Who was I kidding? He probably already had the former. For all I knew, he was getting ready to bust the door down at exactly fifteen seconds.

I put my hair up in a towel, dried myself off, and put my clothes on. The watch on my wrist had started a timer when I had said I would only be fifteen minutes and I was watching the seconds. Three… Two… I opened the door open at exactly zero and, just as I had suspected, Nguyen was standing there. I gave him an “I told you so” smile and headed over to my luggage.

“Here,” I said, holding out a small stack of my documents.

Nguyen took them, but he didn’t budge. I just looked back at him like he was acting strange before he decided to take a few steps forward. Digging around some more, I sheepishly handed him another stack of documents. He took these ones, too, but he still didn’t budge. I rolled my eyes and turned my luggage upside down so anything loose could come out. Several more stacks fell out onto the floor along with some other personal effects -- lipstick, eyeshadow, whatever. I rummaged through the small mess I’d made and handed him the last of my fakes.

“You’re no better than any of us,” Mauga mentioned from the other side of the room.

“I never claimed to be better than you,” I huffed. “You have my doc--”

“No, I don’t,” Nguyen told me.

“Jeez,  _ fine. _ ” I stormed over to my jacket and took out my reals. “Here. At least I was helping people…”

“That’s it?”

“That’s all of it.”

“You don’t want to know what will happen if I find out you have more laying around here somewhere.”

“The rest of my documents are at home. You want me to hand those over to you, too? Right; I can’t, because you have everything I brought with me. So, er, when  _ do  _ I get to go home?”

“If it were up to me, you wouldn’t even be able to leave, but since this  _ job  _ tends to be international…”

“Sucks to be you, then.”

I took my hair out of the towel to finish drying it when my cell phone began ringing from somewhere. Who was even calling me? I never got phone calls unless it was important. I looked around the room, confused, and dropped the towel on the floor to start looking for it. As soon as I found it, hiding beneath the bed, Nguyen held his hand out for me to give it to him. I swatted him away as I answered it.

“Alani,” I sighed.

“Miss Kahananu’i?”

“Uh… Mister Mahiʻai? Why are you calling me? Is everything okay?”

There’d apparently been a bad storm the day before; most homes close enough to the shore had been either destroyed or flooded. Meaning, most of the houses had been affected. My house was okay because it was far inland, but I didn’t completely understand why I was being called. Mister Mahi’ai was the man who had initially started up the soup kitchen on the island; his hut -- if it really could be called that -- had most likely been hit by the storm as well.

“I was told to call you and ask if you could have a hand in helping repair everything,” he said.

“I can’t right now,” I said. “I’m, uh… I’m a little busy at the moment and I’m not sure when I’ll be home.”

Not like I was going to help at this point. I realized he didn’t even ask if I was okay with that and that he didn’t even say “please”. If he’d done either of those things, I might have considered it. Well...I could, on one exception.

“How is Miss Mercia’s house?” I wondered, slapping Nguyen’s hand away again -- I could tell he was getting impatient.

“Her house was destroyed,” Mahi’ai informed me. “Not too much damage was done, but…”

I could forgive little children for not knowing any better when it came to saying “please” and “thank you”. If Mercia’s house was destroyed, that meant Elle didn’t have anywhere to sleep. Mercia didn’t have a lot of money to begin with -- well, most of the residents didn’t. But I couldn’t punish children for their parents' incompetence, could I? No, I couldn’t. I had to ask how many more children would be without a home if I didn’t help immediately. Luckily it wasn’t many but I still didn’t feel okay giving anyone any money. But Elle was such a sweet little girl who only ever wanted to get to know me and learn about my “adventures”.

“Okay, I’ll...see what I can do,” I mumbled. “Just give me a moment, okay?”

I got off the phone and immediately went into my bank account. The amount I’d be sending my village would barely put a dent in the balance. This was going to have to be the last time and then I was going to have to come up with some excuse as to why I couldn’t give any more money to them. I sent off the money to them, turned off my phone, and handed it over to Nguyen, who was now annoyed with me. It wasn’t like I’d done anything inherently  _ bad. _

“You should really come to my house in Hawai’i sometime,” I told him as I began shoving my things into my luggage. “It wouldn’t kill you to calm down and relax, would it? I cook, too.”

“Save your flirting for someone else,” he commanded. “You get to stay here; you just can’t leave.”

“You mean in the hotel?”

“What else would I mean?”

I shrugged, which seemed to annoy him just a bit more and caused him to grab my arm just tight enough that I couldn’t easily get out of his grip. Now  _ I  _ was annoyed.

“Just because you get to stay here doesn’t mean you can go off and do whatever you please,” he informed me. “You  _ will  _ be watched and we  _ will  _ be notified should you do anything to arouse suspicion.”

“Okay, whatever, sure,” I retorted, shrugging him off. “Can I sleep now or do you need something else?”

“Mauga, watch her. If she does anything she shouldn’t, you know what to do.”

“You’re gonna just leave?” Mauga wondered.

“I have other important matters to attend to.”

“I’m not important?” I muttered.

“Not to me.”

Nguyen finally left without another word, shutting the door loudly enough behind him that I flinched. I mentioned to Mauga that I was going to sleep and he could do whatever it was that he did. Granted, there wasn’t much to do inside of a hotel room besides watch TV and sleep, which he decided to do the former. I didn’t realize just how tired I was until I hit the pillow before immediately passing out.

💋💋💋

I awoke sometime later to my stomach grumbling. When was the last time I had eaten, exactly? I’d had some finger food at the art gallery, but that wasn’t really eating, was it? I climbed out of bed and grabbed my jacket before pulling my hair back into a ponytail. Knowing that if I went out alone and got caught and how much trouble I would be in, I wandered over to the couch where, at some point, Mauga had passed out. Shaking him didn’t wake him up and neither did a few soft pokes on his shoulder.

“Hey, wake up,” I said groggily, leaning on the couch. “Up.”

When he still didn’t wake up, I poked him even harder. If it wasn’t for his chest moving, I probably would have guessed he was dead. I didn’t think someone in the kind of business he was in could sleep so deeply, but clearly I was wrong on that front. Even I didn’t sleep that deeply in my own house. Finally, I decided it was best to just hit him to get him up. That ended up working and so I quickly moved out of the way and off the couch.

“What are you hitting me for?” he asked.

“You looked dead,” I lied. “Let’s go get food.”

“Who’s paying for that?”

I sucked on my teeth with a sigh and stomped my foot lightly on the ground. “Nguyen took my credit cards, so I guess it’s going to have to be you.”

“You don’t even carry cash?”

“Not enough for both of us. Can you be a gentleman and pay for this lady just once?”

“It ain’t as nice if you have to ask, you know.”

I put my sandals on before gesturing to the hotel room’s door, beginning to get quite annoyed again. It wasn’t that I got angry when I was hungry -- hangry, as it were, but it was the back and forth talking about just getting food that made the annoyance even worse. I wasn’t about to start arguing, either.

“If I had my credit cards and I was allowed to at least go out into the city on my own, I would’ve taken the liberty of bringing you something back, too,” I mentioned. “Can we go or not? Or do I really need to pout?”

“Fine, you broke me down,” Mauga said in a joking manner as he stood. “Think we should get Nguyen something, too?”

“Did he ever mention if and when he was coming back?” I opened the door and stepped out. “Why are we stuck in my hotel room? Besides you having to watch me, anyway.”

“He should be back  _ sometime.  _ He’s gotta do a background check on you before they’ll let you into headquarters.”

I felt like the air got knocked out of me, but sighed, allowing my words to come out quietly. “Good luck with that.”

“Huh?”

“Nothing.”

Out on the street, it was still early evening. If I still had my reals or my fakes, I could have easily disappeared into the crowds and tried to head back to Hawai’i. But obviously I couldn’t. The background check didn’t bother me, per se, but the aftermath when Nguyen couldn’t find anything  _ did  _ bother me. He could search and search all he liked, or all anyone liked, but they would find nothing. It was probably obvious that Alani Kahananu’i wasn’t my birth name or the name my adopted family gave me, but it was mine and that was all that mattered, really. There was a reason why I didn’t go by my “real” name and it was simply to cut ties with such abusive and horrifying people.

“You wanna stop here?”

I looked up, having not realized I had been lost in thought. “Beg pardon?”

“I thought you didn’t beg,” Mauga mentioned. “You doing good?”

“I’m fine. This place is fine. What is this place?”

“When in Rome…”

He didn’t continue his sentence, but instead held the door open for me to walk through. The air inside smelled strongly of tomatoes, herbs, and wine. Well, I didn’t typically eat pasta, not even pizza for that matter, but I guessed he was right -- when in Rome, do as the Romans do. I was sure we were using that quote wrong, but nevertheless I had never actually had authentic Italian food. Somehow I knew if I asked if we could go to someplace that was also in America, Mauga would tell me to live a little, even though I lived...a lot.

“How often are you in Rome, anyway?” I wondered while we waited for our food.

“I’m barely here,” he admitted. “They figured if I were here when we caught you then you wouldn’t put up too much of a fight.”

“So grappling out of Baptiste’s way and over the roof and through a bunch of alleyways wasn’t ‘much of a fight’?”

“Not as bad as jumping out of a tower.”

“Uh, I didn’t  _ just  _ jump out of a tower. It was a swan dive and it was onto a wagon of apples. I really wouldn’t recommend it. You probably could have thrown one of those other agents out the window after me.”

That suggestion seemed to really amuse Mauga; he laughed loud enough that it startled some of the other patrons. The only amusing thing about it was that he probably really could  _ not  _ have done it; at least not while they were wearing armour. I only managed to barely fit through that damn window -- being a smaller lady and nimble on my feet didn’t necessarily mean I would fit through small openings. I was only so lucky that I managed to get away with apple sized bruises on my back and not scratches on my shoulders, arms, and legs from the stone of the tower.

“I’ll keep that in mind for some other time, maybe,” Mauga said.

What “other time”? Was Talon expecting me to try and make a break for it at some point? I’d go home whenever they let me go. They could send people to check in on me if they were so inclined to make sure I was where I said I was. I folded my arms across my chest. The only thing I needed to do was “behave” so I could get back to Hawai’i sooner rather than later. With any luck, it’d only be another month before I was back in my house.

“Do you really need those people?” Mauga suddenly inquired.

“What people?” I muttered.

“Back home.”

“It’s not the people I need; it’s my house I need.”

“What, you got plants that need watering?”

“No. It’s my  _ house.  _ I love my house. It’s where I can actually be...Alani, the islander who doesn’t need to worry about being killed or caught. Where I can actually let my guard down. The offer to come to my house was really directed at you, by the by.”

“You’d let me in your house?”

“Don’t get hasty about anything, Mauga.”

“Why? You got a husband or something we don’t know about? We’d find him, if that’s the case.”

“I live alone.”

“So you’re a heartbreaker. I get it.”

I looked up at him, feeling like I had an annoyed expression on my face, and then away when the service worker came out with our food. I didn’t know anybody who actually liked me like that. If anyone back home felt that way, they certainly never made it known to me, whether it was because maybe I was too rich for them and would feel like I was out of their league, or just because they loved my money. People  _ did  _ like my money since I  _ was  _ the richest person on the island, but I never got flowers out of the blue or whatever it was that people gave to the people they liked. Even if that was the case, maybe I was just too focused on myself and my work to realize that someone liked me. I didn’t like anyone on the island in that way, either. Maybe I was a heartbreaker but just didn’t realize. Well, that wasn’t my problem, now, was it?

“Theoretically speaking…  _ Theoretically,  _ Mauga,” I said as we wandered back to the hotel, chewing on the straw of my water cup. “If I had...ulterior motives...to invite you back to my house...how would I even hug you? My arms could never wrap around you. They could wrap around your neck, but I would rather not have to stand on my kitchen counter to hug you.”

“You have legs,” Mauga reminded me, nonchalant. “They could wrap around my neck, so no climbing would be required.”

“Wha--”

His comment made me inhale the water, which in turn made me start coughing almost uncontrollably. That was so bold of him to say. How long had he been even holding onto that comment for, anyway? It wasn’t even as if I didn’t understand what he meant; I understood him perfectly. He whacked my back with one of his hands so I could “get it out” and finally breathe again. Once I managed to finally compose myself, I glared up at him, but that didn’t seem to faze him one bit.

“Don’t tell me you didn’t see it coming,” he teased.

“I didn’t,” I breathed. “Really. And I  _ did  _ say ‘theoretically’.”

“Yeah, you said it, but do you  _ really  _ mean it?”

“Tsk. Shut up.”

Upon returning to the hotel, Nguyen had come back at some point while we were out. We couldn’t have been gone for that long, either, but he really did look displeased. Did this man ever  _ not  _ look displeased? It was getting so tiring. In either case, I gave him a slight wave.

“How was the background search?” I wondered. “Find anything...useful?”

“Yes,” he said. “Alani Kahananu’i didn’t exist until seven years ago.”

“Mm… Okay, and…? It’s not identity fraud.”

“Even Talon’s best hacker couldn’t find you past that. So out with it.”

“Does it matter? I’m Alani  _ now. _ ”

“Kahananu’i, I don’t have the patience for your little games. You either cooperate with us fully or everything could end here.”

If he wanted to know about me, about  _ past  _ me, then I had to give it to him. I didn’t want to be killed just because I was having fun being stubborn. Rolling my eyes, I handed him the food Mauga had so kindly gotten for him and led him over to the table.

“Could you wait outside?” I asked.

“Shouldn’t I hear it, too?” Mauga wondered.

“You can be briefed later,” Nguyen told him.

Mauga shrugged and stepped back out into the hotel’s hallway, leaving the two of us alone. I sipped on my water, thinking of where I should start. There were plenty of places for me to start, really. But I had to land on something soon, lest this impatient and horribly serious man get even more impatient on me.

“My first legal name was Hazel Castillo,” I explained. “My birth parents didn’t want me, so the Castillos adopted me, and they also didn’t want me. Before me, they had ten biological children, and after me they had six more adopted kids. Can you guess who the black sheep was?”

“The Castillos?” Nguyen asked.

“I don’t consider them my family. I never have. That house…” I scowled at the memory of how cramped it was in such a large place. “Aren’t you supposed to accept your children as they are, whether they’re blood or not?”

“You are the way you are because they did not accept you?”

“I am the way I am because of how they treated me.  _ Look at me.  _ I’m darker than them. All of them, even my younger adoptive siblings. They treated me differently, and for what? They made it out that I should have been grateful that they took in someone like me. Did the other kids get beat or berated or starved? Of course not. The only love I was ever shown was being given the bare minimum to what my other siblings got just because Janice and Logan didn’t want to be reported to the authorities. How do you think I learned how to be by myself or get myself out of bad situations?”

“Where are they? We can find them and make them--”

“Pay? Trust me. They paid already. Even if you would only want to torture them for money…” I scoffed, “it wouldn’t work. I’ll be on the balcony.”

“Kahana--”

I put my hands up as if I was surrendering. “I’m going to keep the door open. Leave me alone for five minutes, would you? Just...five...damn...minutes.  _ Please. _ ”

I took my food out onto the balcony with me to watch the sunset. It was probably one of the only things, when I was on one of my jobs, that brought me peace. I crossed my legs on the chair with a sigh before regaining my appetite. Pasta from an actual Italian restaurant in Italy was something else. Then again, I hadn’t actually had pasta back in the States in a long time. But it  _ was  _ good. The street below was calming down, so I could actually eat in peace and quiet. Well, as much peace and quiet as I could get with hearing Mauga and Nguyen talk about work or whatever it was that needed to be talked about. I wasn’t going back into the room until Nguyen left; I’d stay out on the balcony all night if I had to, otherwise I might have punched him in his face, or kicked him in a spot that would really,  _ really  _ hurt. If I was fine with my past, then I would have had no reason to change my name at all or be so secretive.

“You want company?” Mauga asked.

“We both know it doesn’t matter what I say,” I stated. “You’d come out here, anyway.”

“No lies there.”

“You can tell Nguyen that whoever would be looking into my adoptive family… Well, it would be a waste of time.”

“Nguyen’s gotta give Sombra  _ something _ .”

“Just ‘something’? Obituaries.”

I finally looked at him and I saw that he wasn’t taking me seriously. Really, all anyone would be able to find on my family was obituaries. One after another. None of them were alive -- not the grandparents, not the parents, not the grandkids, not the biological children, not even the adoptive children. They were all dead and I wasn’t upset about it.

“I’m serious,” I told him. “I got a stack of all of them at home to remind me. One day I plan on using them as fireplace kindling. My adoptive grandfather -- my adoptive father’s father -- is the reason why I’m not scared of guns. My adoptive mother’s mother is why I don’t cry. Let’s not get started on her father. I left when I was sixteen and changed my name soon after. I didn’t leave sooner, but I wish I did, because I didn’t want to give them an excuse to treat me even worse if the police brought me back. Getting hit with a belt? My absolute  _ favourite  _ past-time.”

The bit about getting hit with a belt was sarcasm, of course.

“Oh, the waterboarding was fun, too,” I continued. “And the starvation and the  _ names  _ and the electrocution. If they hated me so much, why would they adopt me? Because they wanted to look  _ good  _ to the neighbourhood. The kids were just as bad. The younger siblings -- they weren’t even that much younger than me, and the same goes for the older siblings. The whole family treated the Omnics in the household better than they treated me.”

“All that’s why nothing we do scares you, huh?” Mauga wondered.

“Nothing is scarier than the people who are supposed to love you and protect you doing the complete opposite. I may have managed to hide the scars with my tattoos, but I’ll never forget what they did, and I made sure they knew that.”

“So you’re the reason why those obituaries exist in the first place?”

“I’d do it again if I could.”

“How many people are we talking here?”

“Eighteen people -- most of them were boys. I saved the paternal grandfather for last so he could watch his grandchildren, wife, and children die. I did him in slowly. I’ve never been so satisfied in my life.” I let out a nostalgic sigh and looked at Mauga. “Told you I never claimed to be a better person than you guys.”

It was quiet between us for a good few moments. My paternal grandfather had tried to stop me early on -- what was shrouded in a lie of a simple visit quickly turned into a killing spree. I had ended up knocking him down when he grabbed his shotgun. That resulted in him reflexively pulling the trigger, but instead of shooting me, he shot the chandelier, which ended up falling onto his wife. Too bad that hadn’t killed her; it would have saved her so much pain. The grandchildren and younger kids couldn’t hide for long. Just because it was a big house, it didn’t mean that there were many hiding spots. I knew that house like the back of my hand from having to hide from whomever had decided it was their turn to punish me when I was a kid. If there had been babies involved, I obviously would not have harmed them. The youngest grandchild was thirteen and the youngest sibling was fifteen.

My adopted mother, Janice, had tried begging for her life and for her husband’s, Logan, life. The kids I had gotten rid of quickly, but the older the person was, the slower the killing was. I didn’t know what made her think I would spare her when I didn’t spare the girls and boys who had cried. Logan saw reason and didn’t dare try to beg or plead. All he did was comment that he had always known I was a bad seed, and that perhaps I would have been better off on the streets growing up. The only reason the two of them died as quick as they did was because they were so broken up about how I had killed their favourite daughter in front of them. 

That daughter had made the mistake of trying to fight back. She’d burst out of the closet she was hiding from, subsequently knocking me backwards, and running off down the hall to try and untie her parents. It didn’t take me long to take after her, jumping onto her from behind, and knocking her against the closed double doors so hard that they opened. She fought the hardest, I had to give her that, but like the rest of her siblings -- blood or otherwise -- I overpowered her easily. I always hated her -- always. She got the pretty bedroom, and the pretty toys, and the pretty clothes… She was just the prettiest one and she never had to work for the approval of anyone. I ended up dragging her by her pretty hair to the armoire and bashing her head against it hard enough and long enough that eventually her skull cracked open. As if that hadn’t been enough, I knocked over the armoire, which solidified in my mind that she was dead.

Janice cursed me out for killing her children, but her words really fell on deaf ears. She didn’t need to tell me she hated me anymore, considering that’s all I heard from her growing up under her roof. And she had the absolute nerve to wonder how I turned out the way I did -- why I stole, why I skipped school, why I caused so much trouble. Because even if I wasn’t doing anything wrong -- like doing homework, for example -- somebody always found a reason to hurt me or torture me or berate me.

Now, my paternal adoptive grandfather was the longest because he was the oldest. It felt like a challenge when he told me he couldn’t do anything to harm him since I’d already killed his whole family. That was quickly disproven when I secured him as tightly as possible to the chair I had him tied to and I slowly and carefully stripped his skin from his body. I could only imagine how badly it hurt, how badly it stung, and I added even more salt to his wounds -- literally. When I was a kid, I always wanted to be a scientist, and this was probably as close to dissecting something as I would get. I never forgot the cigarette burns or the boot stomps or the guns shot at me just to scare me.

“If no one believes me, I saw the reports from when the police found them all,” I told Mauga. “They’ll see the causes of all their deaths.”


End file.
